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Saturday, December 13, 2014

Terror in the Skies

Nothing like realizing you're going home tomorrow to make you go "oh, I should really write about this trip." I've been busy people, living life!

Taking terrifying propeller flights from tiny cities in Mozambique to even tinier towns, for example. The beach in Mozambique where my friends Mark and Annie were a few years back is called Tofo. It's pronounced like Tofu for some strange reason but I don't judge because I call Roosevelt Rooooooosevelt, as you'll recall.

Anyways Mark and Annie described this place like a paradise and such a lovely break from grueling overland travel through Africa in such a way that made me really want to go there. You can scuba dive with whale sharks and manta rays, you can surf, you can have $5 lobsters on the beach, etc.

The only problem with Tofu is that it's a nine hour bus ride from Maputo (pronounced Maputu) and that's like 9 hours in Africa-hot weather, with 100 people in a 15 seater bus. And so I decided it would be better to just take a flight from Maputoto to Tofo.

The only Mozambican airline is called LAM (owned 50% by the president of course) and the South Africans have nicknamed it "late and maybe". In fact my flight to Tofo was delayed by four hours, and the only reason I knew that is because the woman checking me in sort of half-mentioned it off the cuff after she had taken my bag. The Maputo airport was quite a confusing place, actually. I tried to get some wifi so I could call some friends to take me for a coffee on my delay but nobody will let you use their wifi, not even LAM after they delay your flight for four hours. The LAM lounge is called Flamingo. It's for business class only and it's completely empty. I weaseled my way in there, even after the rude woman told me that it would be too dangerous to let me sit in the lounge because "what if I have to leave my desk?" She kicked me out after ten minutes but the wifi wasn't working anyway. ANYWAY I basically sat in the airport for four hours without wifi or even a book because they took my bag and then I had to take this plane and OMG it was scary:

Never a good sign when the cockpit is open to the rest of the plane. No word on whether the pilot wore crocs.